With regard to digital cameras that have become widely available at a rapid pace, there have been an improvement in picture quality and an increase in the number of pixels in recent years. Along with these advancements, a variety of features that improve user operability have been proposed. A shooting scene selection feature is one of such features that improve the operability. This feature allows a user to select such shooting modes as a macro shooting mode, a night scenery shooting mode, a portrait shooting mode and a scenery shooting mode by operating a mode dial or cursor keys provided on the body of a digital still camera. By selecting a given shooting mode, the picture image suited for the shooting is automatically set. For example, when the macro shooting mode is selected, the firing of the flash is disabled and the edge enhancement correction gain is lowered from a usual level. Further, when the night scenery shooting mode is selected, the firing of the flash is enabled and a slow shutter speed is set.
In the method of selecting shooting scenes disclosed in Non-patent document 1, first, the mode dial is operated to shift the mode of the digital camera to a scene mode, and then, cursor keys are operated to select a desired shooting scene from a list of shooting scenes displayed on a monitor screen.
Non-patent document 1: Operating Instructions for Digital Camera DMC-FX9 manufactured by Matsushita Electric Industrial, Co., Ltd.